The modern synthesis in evolutionary biology is taken to be that period in which a consensus developed among biologists about the major causes of evolution, a consensus that informed research in evolutionary biology for at least a half century. As such, it is a particularly fruitful period to consider when reflecting on the meaning and role of chance in evolutionary explanation. Biologists of this period make reference to “chance” and loose cognates of “chance,” such as: “random,” “contingent,” “accidental,” “haphazard,” or (...) “stochastic.” Of course, what an author might mean by “chance” in any specific context varies. -/- In the following, we first offer a historiographical note on the synthesis. Second, we introduce five ways in which synthesis authors spoke about chance. We do not take these to be an exhaustive taxonomy of all possible ways in which chance meaningfully figures in explanations in evolutionary biology. These are simply five common uses of the term by biologists at this period. They will serve to organize our summary of the collected references to chance and the analysis and discussion of the following questions: • What did synthesis authors understand by chance? • How did these authors see chance operating in evolution? • Did their appeals to chance increase or decrease over time during the synthesis? That is, was there a “hardening” of the synthesis, as Gould claimed (1983)? (shrink)

The modern synthesis in evolutionary biology is taken to be that period in which a consensus developed among biologists about the major causes of evolution, a consensus that informed research in evolutionary biology for at least a half century. As such, it is a particularly fruitful period to consider when reflecting on the meaning and role of chance in evolutionary explanation. Biologists of this period make reference to “chance” and loose cognates of “chance,” such as: “random,” “contingent,” “accidental,” “haphazard,” or (...) “stochastic.” Of course, what an author might mean by “chance” in any specific context varies. In the following, we first off er a historiographical note on the synthesis. Second, we introduce five ways in which synthesis authors spoke about chance. (shrink)

BackgroundThe Health Research Council of New Zealand is the first major government funding agency to use a lottery to allocate research funding for their Explorer Grant scheme. This is a somewhat controversial approach because, despite the documented problems of peer review, many researchers believe that funding should be allocated solely using peer review, and peer review is used almost ubiquitously by funding agencies around the world. Given the rarity of alternative funding schemes, there is interest in hearing from the first (...) cohort of researchers to ever experience a lottery. Additionally, the Health Research Council of New Zealand wanted to hear from applicants about the acceptability of the randomisation process and anonymity of applicants.MethodsThis paper presents the results of a survey of Health Research Council applicants from 2013 to 2019. The survey asked about the acceptability of using a lottery and if the lottery meant researchers took a different approach to their application.ResultsThe overall response rate was 39%, with 30% from applicants in the years 2013 to 2018, and 68% for those in the year 2019 who were not aware of the funding result. There was agreement that randomisation is an acceptable method for allocating Explorer Grant funds with 63% in favour and 25% against. There was less support for allocating funds randomly for other grant types with only 40% in favour and 37% against. Support for a lottery was higher amongst those that had won funding. Multiple respondents stated that they supported a lottery when ineligible applications had been excluded and outstanding applications funded, so that the remaining applications were truly equal. Most applicants reported that the lottery did not change the time they spent preparing their application.ConclusionsThe Health Research Council’s experience through the Explorer Grant scheme supports further uptake of a modified lottery. (shrink)

This collection, the first of its kind, brings together specially commissioned academic essays to mark fifty years since the death of John Kennedy Toole.

On March 12, 2018, I received an email from André De Tienne, General Editor of the Peirce Edition Project. He recommended that I visit the Francis Blake archives at the Massachusetts Historical Society, remarking, Francis Blake was a cousin of Charles Peirce. I have not yet figured out how that cousinage works out genealogically. In any case, on 13 January 1893, the day CSP and Juliette returned from Boston to New York after the Lowell Lectures, they first took (...) a trip to Weston, MA, to visit Frank Blake, and from there they went to Worcester to visit W. Stanley Hall at Clark University. … If you look in folder R L49, it... (shrink)

Kenneth Einar Himma (2009, 2016) argues that the existence of Hell renders procreation impermissible. Jason Marsh (2015) contends that problems of evil motivate anti-natalism. Anti-natalism is principally rejected for its perceived conflict with reproductive rights. I propose a theistic solution to the latter problem. Universalism says that all persons will, postmortem, eventually be eternally housed in Heaven, a superbly good place wherein harm is fully absent. The acceptance of universalism is now widespread, but I offer further reason to embrace (...) one variant of it. If universalism is true and there are opportunities to procreate in Heaven, then reproductive autonomy is largely preserved for everyone. Assuming Heaven is a harm-free place, there are no risks to children born in Heaven, unlike Earth or Hell. While this requires human persons to accept temporary restrictions on procreation during our premortem lives, the bulk of reproductive autonomy is preserved since one will have infinite opportunities to reproduce in Heaven. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article:Nigel Blake, Thinking Again: Education after Postmodernism.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 34 (winter 2014–15): 131–4 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036–01631; online 1913–8032 c:\users\ken\documents\type3402\rj 3402 050 red.docx 2015-02-04 9:19 PM _ibliography NEW PERIODICAL ARTICLES BY RUSSELL Kenneth Blackwell here are 35 new C entries since 1993 for A Bibliography of Bertrand Russell, and more for all Parts of Vol. 2. With many thanks to several readers. C15.18a [RECONSTRUCTION (...) OF INTELLECTUAL INTERNATIONALISM AFTER THE WAR]. Svenska Dagbladet, Stockholm, 18 July 1915, sec. b, p. 5. Published under the general title “Det kulturella samarbetets återupptagande efter kriget” [The re-establishment of cultural cooperation after the war]. There is a subtitle : “Tre nya svar på Svenska Dagbladets världsenquête” [Three new responses to Svenska Dagbladet’s world enquiry].—Ms. (ra3 rec. acq. 1,325).—In English in Russell, n.s. 18 (1998): 141–3 (ed. K. Blackwell). C16.07a THE CASE OF MR. E. CHAPPELOW. The Manchester Guardian, 19 April 1916, p. 6. Six sentences, introduced thus: “The Hon. Bertrand Russell writes”.—Russell makes reference to the Everett case. C16.10a THE CASE OF THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR. The Freethinker, 36 (14 May 1916): 310. “… the country is drifting into the infliction of serious persecution upon a large number of young men.…”—Reprinted, with two-thirds omitted, in Jim Herrick, Vision and Realism: a Hundred years of The Freethinker (London: Foote, 1982), pp. 51–2. C22.39 INSTINCT, HABIT, AND INTELLIGENCE. Hull Weekly Recorder, no. 1 (16 Dec. 1922): 6–9. Reprinted in Collected Papers 16 (in preparation). C23.10a BERTRAND RUSSELL PREDICTS U.S. WILL EVENTUALLY CONTROL THE ENTIRE WORLD. The Daily Argus, Mt. Vernon, ny, 7 March 1923, p. 3. Subtitled “Famous British Philosopher Declares America Will Conquer through Economic Causes What Others Have Tried to Win by Force”.—A note states: “Written exclusively for I.N.S.” (International News Service).—Reprinted in Collected Papers 16 (in preparation). C28.02a WHAT I THINK OF COMPANIONATE MARRIAGE. Children, the Magazine for Parents, Chicago, 3 (Feb. 1928): 17. Russell’s contribution—one of four under the title, the others being by Ernest R. Groves, Stephen S. Wise, and Anna Garlin Spencer, pp. 17, 47—is five sentences long.—Reprinted in Collected Papers 18 (in preparation). C28.02b [ADVICE ON WRITING]. The Daily Illini (U. of Illinois), Champaign, il, 12 Feb. 1928, p. 15. Letter to the author on developing a writing style, quoted fully in Newton York, q= 132 kenneth blackwell c:\users\ken\documents\type3402\rj 3402 050 red.docx 2015-02-04 9:19 PM “What Authors Advise”, ibid.—Part of Russell’s advice is to “read Gibbon all through, at least twice.” —Reprinted in Collected Papers 18 (in preparation). C32.39a MR. BERTRAND RUSSELL’S QUESTIONS. The Manchester Guardian, 27 June 1932, p. 10. Letter to a Coventry correspondent, under the title, “The Dismissed Teacher”. C34.36a ROMAN-CELTIC FARM SITE. The Times, 18 Sept. 1934, p. 7. Letter in “Points from Letters”, signed by John Russell, Telegraph House, Harting, Petersfield, referring to S. E. Winbolt’s “A Roman-Celtic Farm Site; Discovery near Harting, Sussex”, ibid., 10 Sept. 1934, p. 7. The writer states that his part was “not so great” as it appears in the account.—The composition of the letter is ascribed here to Bertrand Russell because a draft, with the exception of a phrase added later, is entirely in his fluent hand. That of his 13-year-old son is not present.—The draft was crossed out, and the verso became folio 1 of the ms. of “On Ceremony” (C34.48). C34.55a [THE AMERICAN LIBRARY OF NAZI BANNED BOOKS]. Jewish Daily Bulletin, New York, 11, no. 3,030 (23 Dec. 1934): 1. A telegram congratulating the Brooklyn Jewish Center for “inaugurating an American Library for Nazi burnt books”.—The allusion is to the Nazi bonfire of banned books on 10 May 1933.—The dinner celebrating the Library and mentioned in Russell’s telegram is the subject of Joseph Goldberg, “ ‘A Splendid and Historic Gathering’: Brooklyn Jewish Center Inaugurates Library of Nazi Banned books”, Brooklyn Jewish Center Review... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 34 (winter 2014–15): 131–4 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036–01631; online 1913–8032 c:\users\ken\documents\type3402\rj 3402 050 red.docx 2015-02-04 9:19 PM _ibliography NEW PERIODICAL ARTICLES BY RUSSELL Kenneth Blackwell here are 35 new C entries since 1993 for A Bibliography of Bertrand Russell, and more for all Parts of Vol. 2. With many thanks to several readers. C15.18a [RECONSTRUCTION (...) OF INTELLECTUAL INTERNATIONALISM AFTER THE WAR]. Svenska Dagbladet, Stockholm, 18 July 1915, sec. b, p. 5. Published under the general title “Det kulturella samarbetets återupptagande efter kriget” [The re-establishment of cultural cooperation after the war]. There is a subtitle : “Tre nya svar på Svenska Dagbladets världsenquête” [Three new responses to Svenska Dagbladet’s world enquiry].—Ms. (ra3 rec. acq. 1,325).—In English in Russell, n.s. 18 (1998): 141–3 (ed. K. Blackwell). C16.07a THE CASE OF MR. E. CHAPPELOW. The Manchester Guardian, 19 April 1916, p. 6. Six sentences, introduced thus: “The Hon. Bertrand Russell writes”.—Russell makes reference to the Everett case. C16.10a THE CASE OF THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR. The Freethinker, 36 (14 May 1916): 310. “… the country is drifting into the infliction of serious persecution upon a large number of young men.…”—Reprinted, with two-thirds omitted, in Jim Herrick, Vision and Realism: a Hundred years of The Freethinker (London: Foote, 1982), pp. 51–2. C22.39 INSTINCT, HABIT, AND INTELLIGENCE. Hull Weekly Recorder, no. 1 (16 Dec. 1922): 6–9. Reprinted in Collected Papers 16 (in preparation). C23.10a BERTRAND RUSSELL PREDICTS U.S. WILL EVENTUALLY CONTROL THE ENTIRE WORLD. The Daily Argus, Mt. Vernon, ny, 7 March 1923, p. 3. Subtitled “Famous British Philosopher Declares America Will Conquer through Economic Causes What Others Have Tried to Win by Force”.—A note states: “Written exclusively for I.N.S.” (International News Service).—Reprinted in Collected Papers 16 (in preparation). C28.02a WHAT I THINK OF COMPANIONATE MARRIAGE. Children, the Magazine for Parents, Chicago, 3 (Feb. 1928): 17. Russell’s contribution—one of four under the title, the others being by Ernest R. Groves, Stephen S. Wise, and Anna Garlin Spencer, pp. 17, 47—is five sentences long.—Reprinted in Collected Papers 18 (in preparation). C28.02b [ADVICE ON WRITING]. The Daily Illini (U. of Illinois), Champaign, il, 12 Feb. 1928, p. 15. Letter to the author on developing a writing style, quoted fully in Newton York, q= 132 kenneth blackwell c:\users\ken\documents\type3402\rj 3402 050 red.docx 2015-02-04 9:19 PM “What Authors Advise”, ibid.—Part of Russell’s advice is to “read Gibbon all through, at least twice.” —Reprinted in Collected Papers 18 (in preparation). C32.39a MR. BERTRAND RUSSELL’S QUESTIONS. The Manchester Guardian, 27 June 1932, p. 10. Letter to a Coventry correspondent, under the title, “The Dismissed Teacher”. C34.36a ROMAN-CELTIC FARM SITE. The Times, 18 Sept. 1934, p. 7. Letter in “Points from Letters”, signed by John Russell, Telegraph House, Harting, Petersfield, referring to S. E. Winbolt’s “A Roman-Celtic Farm Site; Discovery near Harting, Sussex”, ibid., 10 Sept. 1934, p. 7. The writer states that his part was “not so great” as it appears in the account.—The composition of the letter is ascribed here to Bertrand Russell because a draft, with the exception of a phrase added later, is entirely in his fluent hand. That of his 13-year-old son is not present.—The draft was crossed out, and the verso became folio 1 of the ms. of “On Ceremony” (C34.48). C34.55a [THE AMERICAN LIBRARY OF NAZI BANNED BOOKS]. Jewish Daily Bulletin, New York, 11, no. 3,030 (23 Dec. 1934): 1. A telegram congratulating the Brooklyn Jewish Center for “inaugurating an American Library for Nazi burnt books”.—The allusion is to the Nazi bonfire of banned books on 10 May 1933.—The dinner celebrating the Library and mentioned in Russell’s telegram is the subject of Joseph Goldberg, “ ‘A Splendid and Historic Gathering’: Brooklyn Jewish Center Inaugurates Library of Nazi Banned books”, Brooklyn Jewish Center Review... (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article:Nigel Blake, Thinking Again: Education after Postmodernism.

We suggest that there is confusion between why consciousness developed and what additional functions, through continued evolution, it has co-opted. Consider episodic memory. If we believe that episodic memory evolved solely to accurately represent past events, it seems like a terrible system—prone to forgetting and false memories. However, if we believe that episodic memory developed to flexibly and creatively combine and rearrange memories of prior events in order to plan for the future, then it is quite a good system. We (...) argue that consciousness originally developed as part of the episodic memory system—quite likely the part needed to accomplish that flexible recombining of information. We posit further that consciousness was subsequently co-opted to produce other functions that are not directly relevant to memory per se, such as problem-solving, abstract thinking, and language. We suggest that this theory is compatible with many phenomena, such as the slow speed and the after-the-fact order of consciousness, that cannot be explained well by other theories. We believe that our theory may have profound implications for understanding intentional action and consciousness in general. Moreover, we suggest that episodic memory and its associated memory systems of sensory, working, and semantic memory as a whole ought to be considered together as the conscious memory system in that they, together, give rise to the phenomenon of consciousness. Lastly, we suggest that the cerebral cortex is the part of the brain that makes consciousness possible, and that every cortical region contributes to this conscious memory system. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Cognition as Information Processing, as Computation, and as Abiding in the Meaningful Operationalism Is This Merely a Terminological Issue? Conclusion.

The COVID-19 pandemic swept through New York City swiftly and with devastating effect. The crisis put enormous pressure on all hospital services, including the clinical ethics consultation team. This report describes the recent experience of the ethics consultants and Columbia University Irving Medical Center during the COVID-19 surge and compares the case load and characteristics to the corresponding period in 2019. By reporting this experience, we hope to supplement the growing body of COVID-19 scientific literature and provide details of the (...) human toll the virus took on our hospitals and communities. We also aim to highlight the role of the clinical ethics consultant as well as areas of policy and law that may need to be addressed in order to be better prepared for a future public health crisis. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: -/- [99] JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 23:1 JANUARY 198 5 Book Reviews Kenneth Dorter. Plato's 'Phaedo': An Interpretation. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982. Pp. xi + 233. $28.50. Kenneth Dorter of the University of Guelph has given us a useful and unusual study of the Phaedo, which will attract the interest of a variety of Plato's readers. He provides the careful studies of (...) the dialogue's arguments for immortality to be expected in a sound commentary, paying close attention to the text as well as to recent scholarship, and displaying a good sense of argument. What gives the book additional interest, however, are its features as an interpretation of the Phaedo. Two stand out. First, Dorter wishes to give full weight not only to the logic of the arguments but also to the dramatic details of Plato's writing, believing these to be important in disclosing Plato's intentions. Secondly, he reads the Phaedo in light of a more general understanding of Plato's philosophy, especially the nature of the soul in its cosmic as well as individual aspects. Much of this is set out in a final speculative chapter, where Dorter seeks to make intelligible Plato's developing conception of soul by means of such notions as energy and poles of consciousness. Not every reader will be persuaded; but Dorter is to be commended for an attempt to move the discussion beyond the Phaedo and Plato's own vocabulary. The study gains its coherence from Dorter's belief that Plato's view of soul cannot support the ostensible aim of the dialogue, to provide reassurance of personal immortality. Although he has no doubt that for the Platonic Socrates there is "a meaningful sense in which we may be called immortal" (94, cf. 159), Dorter's analysis must be stretched to provide that sense. In part this is a result of his assessment of the arguments. The first, from reciprocity in nature, can at most show that, given the eternal nature of the world, soul and corporeality in general must continue to exist. The argument from recollection can point only to a non-empirical element in our knowledge ; that from the soul's kinship with the divine is best seen as an analogy developed to awaken within us a sense of eternity. The final argument, though containing fallacies (157), will support the conclusion that immortal soul is imperishable as long as soul is regarded as motive force in the universe, in the first argument's sense. In none of these discussions, then, can Plato's reasoning yield up personal survival. But there is another part to Dorter's case, underlying this conclusion. For Plato the individual human being is a composite of soul and body; so even if Plato were to prove the immortality of the soul he could never establish personal survival (63-64). It is not surprising then that Dorter is left with a doctrine of immortality either reduced to a "discovery of eternity within ourselves" (77), or else dissolved into a principle of enduring cosmic energy. So in neither case does it seem meaningful for Plato to say that we are immortal: the eternal which we sense is no more us than it is anything else. Although it is of course possible that Plato did not intend this consequence of his arguments, Dorter thinks otherwise. In support he invokes literary features of the dialogue to argue that Plato operates on one level for the less sophisticated (who wish to be persuaded of personal survival) and on another for the philosophically reflective reader. Dorter treats the textual evidence for this claim with an appropriate modesty, and tries to justify Plato's apparent duplicity as an attempt to convince the weak by a 'noble lie' (95-97). Nevertheless this leads Dorter to mix together too quickly for this reader popular religion, myth, and metaphor. To the fact that Plato does not espouse the language of popular religion literally, Dorter adds his own view of myth as an imaginative appeal to emotion that can be translated without loss into rational discourse (7, 165, a95). So the accounts of the afterlife at 8oc-84 b... (shrink)

In _Charles Peirce and Modern Science_, T.L. Short encourages us to read Peirce’s oeuvre in the spirit of philosophical experimentalism. The result is a rewarding and refreshing book that clarifies longstanding controversies and stakes out novel positions in the debates. In these comments, I subject Short’s statements regarding the validity of induction to critical scrutiny. I argue that while much of what he states is correct, he errs in holding that induction is invalid in the short run of an individual’s (...) life. (shrink)

I argue that Hegel is aware of a crucial problem in Kant’s transcendental account of the conditions of human knowledge. Unless the matter of sensation is sufficiently ordered (and sufficiently varied) we could not make any cognitive judgments. In that case we could not distinguish ourselves from objects we know, and so could not be self-conscious. This is a necessary, formal and transcendental condition of possible human experience. However, it is also (as Kant acknowledged) a material – not a conceptual (...) or an intutive – condition. Consequently, Kant’s idealism cannot account for it. This provides one key to Hegel’s internal critique of Kant’s idealism. (shrink)

Within the philosophy of sport, the phenomenon of practising has received very little attention, whereas other related aspects of sport such as excellence and competition have been subjected to many and thorough studies. This essay will attempt to clarify this particular phenomenon of practising through the notion of athletic ascetics, which will be analysed as a special variant of askēsis. Drawing especially on Foucault’s lectures on ascetics in ancient philosophy and Sloterdijk’s anthropology of the practising life, the essay outlines and (...) interrogates the potential relevance of an ascetological understanding of sport. Through both descriptive and normative analysis, it is argued that athletic ascetics can refine our understanding of performance in sport and comprise an embodied account of the formative aspect of ethics, with implications for ethical considerations related to performance enhancement. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Whose New American Poetry? Anthologizing in the NinetiesMarjorie Perloff (bio)In the two-year span 1993–94, no fewer than three major poetry anthologies appeared that featured the poetry of what has been called “the other tradition”—the tradition inaugurated thirty-five years ago by Donald M. Allen’s New American Poetry: 1945–1960. These three anthologies are, in order of publication, Eliot Weinberger’s American Poetry since 1950: Innovators and Outsiders, Paul Hoover’s Postmodern American Poetry, (...) and Douglas Messerli’s From the Other Side of the Century. A New American Poetry 1960–1990. 1 In 1994, moreover, there were two other large anthologies of alternate poetries by “younger” poets, 2 these two in the tradition of Ron Silliman’s In The American Tree: Language, Poetry, Realism and Douglas Messerli’s earlier ‘Language’ Poetries: An Anthology. They are Peter Gizzi, Connell McGrath, and Juliana Spahr’s two-volume anthology called Writing from the New Coast, 3 and Dennis Barone and Peter Ganick’s The Art of Practice: 45 Contemporary Poets.Five volumes, then, of the “new” alternate poetries. And a sixth—this time a real blockbuster—is in progress: Jerome Rothenberg and Pierre Joris’s two-volume Poems for the Millennium: The University of California Book of Modern and Postmodern Poetry, which differs from all of the above by covering poetry and poetics of the entire twentieth century and from around the world. The first volume of Poems for the Millennium, From Fin-de-Siècle to Negritude (1995), takes us from such “forerunners” of Modernism as Blake, Hölderlin, Dickinson, and Rimbaud through the Futurisms, Dada, Surrealism, and Objectivism, along with complex “galleries” of individual poets, while the second—and sure to be more controversial—volume (1997) brings us up to the global present.A new avant-garde thus seems to be in the making—indeed, oxymoronic as it may sound, a new avant-garde consensus. Yet the countercanonizing of the recent anthologies is not without its own aporias. What these are is my subject here.The Modest OppositionMy starting point is that of the avant-garde anthologists themselves: Donald Allen’s New American Poetry of 1960. From the vantage point of 1995, the most startling thing about the Allen anthology—still acknowledged by all later anthologists as the fountainhead of radical American poetics—is its modesty. The New American Poetry runs to 454 pages, including statements of poetics, biographical notes, and a short bibliography; it contains forty-four poets, all of them having come to prominence in the period between 1945 (the [End Page 104] end of World War II) and 1960 (the date of publication). The four-page preface opens as follows:In the years since the war American poetry has entered upon a singularly rich period. It is a period that has seen published many of the finest achievements of the older generation: William Carlos Williams’ Paterson, The Desert Music and Other Poems, and Journey to Love; Ezra Pound’s The Pisan Cantos, Section: Rock-Drill, and Thrones; H. D.’s later work culminating in her long poem Helen in Egypt; and the recent verse of E. E. Cummings, Marianne Moore, and the late Wallace Stevens. A wide variety of poets of the second generation, who emerged in the thirties and forties, have achieved their maturity in this period: Elizabeth Bishop, Edwin Denby, Robert Lowell, Kenneth Rexroth, and Louis Zukofsky, to name only a few very diverse talents. And we can now see that a strong third generation, long awaited but only slowly recognized, has at last emerged.[xi]Note that Allen introduces the “new” American poetry, not as an “alternative” to anything else but as the successor of two preceding generations. He does not quarrel about the Moderns: if Eliot isn’t included in the above list, it is because he had stopped writing lyric poetry after Four Quartets and had turned to the theater. The cited second generation, moreover, is more “diverse” (Allen’s word) here than it will ever be again in the anthologies: Bishop and Denby, Lowell and Rexroth and Zukofsky. And the third generation, presumably following in the footsteps of the first and second, is now said to... (shrink)

pt. 1. 1869-1893.--pt. 2. 1894-1900.--pt. 3. 1901-1908.

Several well-known theodicies, whatever their merits, seem to make little sense of animal suffering. Here we argue that the problem of animal suffering has more layers than has generally been acknowledged in the literature and thus poses an even greater challenge to traditional Judeo-Christian Theism than is normally thought. However, the Neo-Cartesian (NC) defence would succeed in defanging this Expanded Problem of Animal Suffering. Several contemporary philosophers have suggested that recent evidence either supports the NC view or at least should (...) decrease our incredulity with respect to it. We discuss new evidence that undermines the NC position and thus reassert the gravity of the Expanded Problem. (shrink)

A systematic guide to product design and safety from an ethical engineering perspective This hands-on textbook offers a holistic approach to product safety and engineering ethics across many products, fields, and industries. The book shows, step by step, how to “design in” safety characteristics early in the engineering process using design for product safety (DfPS) methods. Written by a P.E. and skilled educator with industry experience, Engineering Ethics and Design for Product Safety addresses all aspects of the product system from (...) the perspective of an active product-safety engineering manager. You will get detailed case studies, real-world examples, and side discussions that provide a deep dive into key topics. Coverage includes: Product safety Engineering ethics Product-safety components Hazards, risks, accidents, and outcomes A product-design process Product-safety engineering Engineering-design guidance Product-safety facilitators Product-safety engineering methods Product-safety defects and recalls. (shrink)

ABSTRACTA Danish fitness chain recently introduced a new concept called Bubbles & Squat. Here, fitness training is combined with free champagne and music. In this paper, we examine this new way of bringing parties, alcohol and physical culture together by exploring the possible meaning of it through existential philosophical analysis. We draw in particular on Nietzsche’s distinction between the Apolline and the Dionysiac, as well as his account of great health. On this basis, we analyse Bubbles & Squat as a (...) case of Dionysiac intoxication, excess and ecstasy sneaking into contemporary Apolline fitness culture. In the last part of the paper, we raise the question if adding parties and bubbles to fitness training may, perhaps paradoxically, be healthy for the participants in an existential sense because it contributes to existential balance between the Dionysiac and the Apolline. We conclude that the philosophical framework presented in this paper can contribute to a new understanding of a general physical c... (shrink)

It has been reported by some studies that the desire to be involved in decisions concerning one’s healthcare especially with regard to obtaining informed consent is related to educational status. The purpose of this study, therefore, is to assess the influence of educational status on attitude towards informed consent practice in three south-eastern Nigerian communities.

Nigel Blake; Church Schools, Religious Education and the Multi-ethnic Community: a reply to David Aspin, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 17, Issue 2.

McCoy, Liu, Lutz, and Sisti (2020) raise concerns about “partial representation,” in which nonelected advocates or advocacy organizations fail to engage and hold themselves accountable to the full range of people they purport to represent. They are right to point out that the autism community is vulnerable to partial representation. This open peer commentary notes some elements among those engaged with autism that may not fit under the type of “federated model” of representation McCoy, et al recommend. Advocates should tread (...) carefully to avoid some types of harm that do not arise when forming federations on other topics. The influence of antivaxxers and other questionable or harmful movements might even lead us to think, despite the value of open debate and engagement, that there is benefit to partial representation if it prevents potential harms that could arise from legitimizing dangerous practices. (shrink)

The book also points to some of the ways in which polities currently termed 'liberal democracies' fall clearly short of the values that might legitimize them.

Nigel Blake; A Position in Society, an Intimate Constraint, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 26, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 271–276, https://doi.org/.

N Blake, P Standish; Bibliography, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 34, Issue 1, 16 December 2002, Pages 203–208, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00.

N Blake, P Standish; Preface, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 34, Issue 1, 16 December 2002, Pages 197–198, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00168.

Nigel Blake; Intellectual Freedom and the Universities: a reply to Anthony O'Hear, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 22, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 25.

N Blake, P Standish; Preface, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 34, Issue 1, 16 December 2002, Pages 197–198, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00168.

Nigel Blake; Peace Education and National Security, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 19, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 27–38, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.

This thought-provoking book develops and elaborates on the artifact theory of law, covering a wide range of related theoretical and practical topics. Offering a range of perspectives that flesh out the artifact theory of law, it also introduces criticisms of previous formulations of the theory and inquires into its potential payoffs. Featuring international contributions from both noted and up-and-coming scholars in law and philosophy, the book is divided into two parts. The first part further explores and evaluates the concept of (...) law as an artifact and analyses the background and theoretical basis of the theory. The second part comprises three sections on legal ontology, semantics and legal normativity, specifically in relation to law's artifactual nature. Providing cutting-edge insights at the intersection of law and philosophy, this book will appeal to scholars and students in philosophy of law, empirical legal studies, social ontology and the philosophy of society. (shrink)

Each year, The Philosopher's Annual presents the ten best articles published in the field of philosophy during the previous twelve months—with the absence of limits on the articles' sources, subject matter, or modes of treatment making for a very diverse collection of engaging, high-caliber work. This year's volume includes papers by Katalin Balog, Tyler Burge, Cheshire Calhoun, Sally Haslanger, Thomas Hofweber, Philip Kitcher, Charles G. Morgan, Thomas W. Pogge, James Pryor, and Elliott Sober.

The apparent implications of the latest findings of the life sciences for our freedom and autonomy are both exciting and controversial: They undermine a common view of human freedom: a fundamentally Cartesian view. A superior account of our freedom was developed by Kant and Hegel. Key features of Hegel's account show that we can expect from the life sciences further insights into the biological basis of our freedom and autonomy, but not their repudiation. I begin with basic features of Cartesian (...) self-transparency (II) and then review three findings of contemporary life sciences (III). I then detail key features of Hegel's anti-Cartesianism (IV), in order to formulate the basic question about our freedom posed by the claim that biology explains away human freedom (V). I criticize this biological determinism by drawing upon Hegel's account of human freedom as autonomy (VI), and comment briefly on biologism in moral theory (VII). (shrink)